How many undocumented border encounters were recorded during each year of the Biden administration (2021–2025)?
Executive summary
Official reporting and independent analyses show millions of “encounters” recorded during the Biden administration, but figures vary by dataset and definition. Congressional and House Republican sources cite “more than 10.5 million” nationwide encounters since FY2021 with over 8.5 million at the southwest border [1]; CBP and research groups note that U.S. Border Patrol alone logged more than 7.2 million Southwest border encounters between Jan 2021 and Jan 2024, including a record ~2.5 million in 2023 [2] [3].
1. What “encounters” means — definitions that change the totals
“Encounters” is an umbrella term used across sources to mean different things: U.S. Border Patrol encounters (migrants apprehended between ports of entry), CBP Nationwide Encounters (adds migrants at ports of entry and parolees), and estimates that try to include “gotaways.” Some sources cited by policymakers and researchers explicitly aggregate these different categories to produce the multi‑million totals attributed to the Biden years [3] [1]. That variation in definitional scope explains why a single year-by-year table is not uniformly reported across the supplied sources [3] [1].
2. Totals cited by Republican oversight and committee reports
Republican House and Senate reports presented aggregated nationwide tallies for the Biden administration era: for example, a House Oversight summary quotes CBP numbers as “more than 10.5 million illegal entry encounters nationwide, with more than 8.5 million of those encounters at the southwest border since the beginning of FY2021” [1]. The same line of reporting emphasizes that a substantial share of those encounters occurred at southwest border sectors [1].
3. Border Patrol’s recorded encounters and notable year spikes
Border Patrol–only counts, which exclude some ports‑of‑entry and parole categories, are large as well. A synthesis of available reporting indicates the Border Patrol recorded “more than 7.2 million” U.S.–Mexico border encounters from January 2021 through January 2024, and 2023 was highlighted as a record year with “over 2.5 million encounters” [2]. Migration Policy Institute reporting likewise shows irregular encounters by U.S. Border Patrol fell after policy changes in mid‑2024, underscoring year‑to‑year volatility [3].
4. Year-by-year reporting: what the sources provide (and what they don’t)
Available sources supply cumulative and fiscal‑year characterizations but do not present a single, consistently calculated table of yearly totals for 2021–2025 in the documents provided. Some pieces give FY‑level snippets — for example, assertions that “just 1st half of January 2025 Border Patrol encounters are nearly 50% lower than at the same point in January 2021” or that March 2025 had a historic low month under one administration’s press claims — but a complete, uniformly computed year‑by‑year breakdown for calendar years 2021–2025 is not contained in the set of supplied sources [4] [5] [3]. Therefore a definitive per‑year list drawn strictly from these documents is not available in current reporting (not found in current reporting).
5. Disagreements, political framing and fact‑checks
Political actors and oversight committees use different aggregates to make divergent claims: Republican committees and advocacy groups emphasize nationwide encounter totals and increased monthly highs [1] [6], while DHS statements and some fact‑checks highlight declines after mid‑2024 policies and point out that port‑of‑entry vs. between‑ports distinctions change the story [4] [3] [7]. PBS and other fact‑checkers have noted misleading comparisons when administrations compare seven‑day averages or mix encounter types to claim huge percentage declines [7].
6. Auxiliary metrics that change interpretation
Beyond raw encounter counts, the policy debate leans heavily on related metrics that change how the totals are read: numbers of people released vs. removed, “gotaways” estimates, the share of encounters at ports of entry vs. between ports, and parole programs (CHNV) that move people through ports of entry and into interior parole — all of which are cited by sources as materially affecting totals and policy interpretation [8] [9] [6].
7. What a responsible next step looks like
For a precise year‑by‑year table you should consult CBP’s official “Nationwide Encounters” and U.S. Border Patrol monthly encounter datasets directly and specify whether you want Border Patrol only, Nationwide (includes ports of entry), or a combined “all sources + gotaways” estimate. The materials provided reference those CBP datasets but do not include a single, consistent year‑by‑year enumeration in this packet [3] [1].
Limitations: This piece uses only the documents you provided. Those documents offer large cumulative totals and selective annual highlights but do not contain a single authoritative, consistently computed table of undocumented border encounters for each year 2021–2025 (not found in current reporting).